2009-12-26

(this post is "sticky" until December 27, 2009. Scroll down for new content)

Here I am creating a collection of Third Edge of the Sword blogposts that contain my best work. The rules for these posts is that they have to contain a large amount of my own actual writing. Longer polemic posts will be afforded much more weight than shorter posts. After I am satisfied with a list of 12 or so posts, I will put a voting box up with the various posts and give readers a chance to vote.

For now, these are what I've come up with. I shall be adding to this list between now (December 22nd) and the 27th or so when I'm ready for the voting block:

Whyte&Mackay, the drinks group that now owns McKinlay and Co., has asked for a sample of the 100-year-old scotch for a series of tests that could decide whether to relaunch the now-defunct Scotch.

Workers from New Zealand's Antarctic Heritage Trust will use special drills to reach the crates, frozen in Antarctic ice under the Nimrod Expedition hut near Cape Royds.

Al Fastier, who will lead the expedition in January, said restoration workers found the crates of whiskey under the hut's floorboards in 2006. At the time, the crates and bottles were too deeply embedded in ice to be dislodged.

Disappointingly, when I read about 100 year old scotch I got all excited. However, because it hasn't spent 100 years aging in oak barrels its not really 100-year old scotch: its probably 8-year old scotch that's been sitting in a bottle for 100 years. It's neat that they are ressurecting an old recipie and all that jazz, but it is not "100 year old scotch" as anybody who's a connoisseur of malted beverages can tell you.

First thing to know about this study is that its such inane and useless drivel that the PDF file has been protected against copying: in other words, I can't just cut and paste some of its assorted claptrap and idiocy. This is a classic defense mechanism when your report is so fundamentally flawed you don't want anybody able to easily forward via email your outrageous claims to be instantly discredited across the planet.

Second thing to know is that the hateful and overtly biases messages contained within this report have been paid for by you, the hapless Alberta taxpayer. Below is a little clip of who contributed to this "report". Feel free to write angry letters to their executive. (click the image to view it full size)

This is important, so follow along: "hate crimes" have been defined in such a way to include things which are not actual criminal acts. Do this to your lawyer, you're scot free. Do this to an asian and you're off to jail.

Page 11 is where this document pretty much dives off the deep end, never to recover. There's a little photocopy of a newspaper article entitled "Muslim leader praises cop action on hate". At 65.7% zoom it seems pretty innocent. Here's what we see when I blow it up to 150% to make it clearly readable: (click the image to view it full size)

That's right, your friend and mine Imam Syed Soharwardy! I've written about him here (I called him a pillow-biter). Ezra Levant has written about him extensively, if there's anything you should read its this recent bit about his anti-Jew efforts in Calgary. He's the poster boy for aryan doctor Valerie Pruegger! Seriously? Seriously?? This just keeps getting better and better.

Page 12 is another example of AHCC's need to keep people cutting and pasting their garbage: one of the bullet points where police find difficulty with hate crimes is: "the high burden of proof necessary to prove these charges in court". No shit. We also see that EPS has the only two hate crime prosecutions lately, which may be because they have a dozen personnel working on finding a guy putting up posters. Where were they when the "Rock Against Bush" ones were going up?

Page 15 is where this whole segment really jumps the shark. It goes onto page 49, and somebody else can really start picking apart the latter 2/3rds of this document. I'll do page 49, and then pages 16-48 can be the realm of somebody else. I have Christmas pies to bake in the morning.

I have done a full screencapture of Page 15 and highlighted a few of the flaws in this document for you to follow along. (click the image to view it full size)

This leads us to our next note, the big red box about 2/5ths the way down the graphic: basically it says that homeless should be another group 'protected' by hate crimes legislation. Yeah, that's the big worry of homeless people: not that they are without homes, or without jobs, or suffering addictions, but their feelings have been hurt when called an uncouth name by a person they came up begging for charity from.

Now, remember above when I said that despite looking like a member of the Hitler Youth, Dr. Valerie Pruegger sure doesn't sound white? Well, here it is: "In the 2006," she starts off a sentence. Oh come on! I've read emails from Nigerian bank scammers who have a more capable grasp of syntax than this Psychology prof!

Now what's the thing that happened "in the 2006"? Well that's our next underline: black persons represented almost half of police-reported incidents in Canada. My quick response would be...so? If black persons want to stop being so represented in discrimination in nightclubs, perhaps they should tackle and turn in these criminals in their own communities who keep causing shit in nightclubs! You know, the same criminals who are known to everybody in the community. Hmm, that sounds like work: much easier to just whine to Mia Dauvergne.

The Aryan guard no matter what their views are have a valid point if they want to have a white pride march then so be it, Calgary has a gay Pride march do we have anti homos come out and try to kick the shit out fags, not that I have seen.

In my point they should have just let them do their march and not interfere they weren't hurting anyone so in respects to the Aryan Guard it wasn't them who caused the trouble it was the anti protesters that came out.

Also contrast with our old buddy Syed, who remember was happily quoted in this same report. Again, take it away Ezra Levant:

The Muslim Council of Calgary and Syed Soharwardy teamed up earlier this year for a pro-terrorist rally in the heart of the Jewish community. Here is some of my coverage of it at the time; here's a picture of them flying the flag of the terrorist group, Hezbollah -- a group deemed a criminal organization in Canada.

You'll notice that, in addition to the terrorist flag, there is a swastika.

I've lived in Calgary Southwest for most of my life, and my parents and grandparents live there, too. None of us has ever seen swastikas in the neighbourhood until the Soharwardy/MCC protests. They didn't just wave swastika signs, they left anti-Semitic graffiti on a wall, too: (image)

To this day you can still see where that graffiti has been painted over.

Week after week the anti-Semites from the MCC and Soharwardy's group came back to the mall in the center of the Jewish neighbourhood. At first, they only waved the terrorist flag furtively. When they saw, though, that the police did nothing to stop them -- but rather accosted any pro-Israel counter-protesters -- the anti-Semites got bolder and bolder, to the point where they parked their cars in the Jewish Centre across the street -- on their way to a Jew-bashing rally! -- and spat on a rabbi passing by.

It was only when the owners of the mall got a restraining order against Soharwardy, the MCC and the other protesters, did the weekly festival of Jew-hatred retreat back into their holes -- oh, except the graffiti.

The bottom line is another curiosity: racial crimes are 'inspired' by anti-immigrant crimes. Hmmm, is it possible, just possible, that the next rendition of this document will be all up in arms about "anti-immigrant" sentiments? After all, why on earth should the residents of a nation-state hold a higher regard to the citizens of said nation state. What kind of goofball idiocy is this....?

With that, we draw page 15 to a close. It's been fun, its been a good run. These people are clearly idiots: they make these silly little powerpoint presentations and hope the rest of us just gloss over the details and don't understand the biases and bigotry and hatred they couch in the language of academia. Dr. Valerie Pruegger and her ilk may care about this crap, but you and me and the average working stiffs of this province are more concerned about being assaulted, being robbed, and being persecuted for cheering on Switzerland.

Secondly, you can see the 7-year-old mindset of these people: "we all look the same inside". So? We all look different outside. Why should one be discounted while the other isn't?

Thank you for enjoying our enjoyment of this document. It could be worse, right? It could accept as gospel the hate-filled ramblings of well known internet racist Ricard Warman, for example. That would make it just complete claptrap.

2009-12-23

If you click the above graphic, you can see clearly what I'm talking about here. Two weeks back during Edmonton's extreme cold snap, this article appeared in the Toronto SUN. Read carefully, its hilarious and sad all at the same time.

The headline blares "Think its cold in Toronto?" It then notes Edmonton's -46C (which wasn't in the city, and in the middle of the night, not that it matters much), as an example of how it could be even colder in Toronto and they should enjoy it.

I've circled the Toronto temperature. A low of.....

...

...

...

...

(drumroll probably wasn't necessary, since you could easily see it because I circled it...)

I've just finished reading probably one of the most offensive things you can find on the planet. I should enroll it in my contest below. Specificially its from Alvin Finkel about how the Wildrose Alliance's labour policies so massively offend the left-wing thugs who depend on union dues (taken, as we shall see below, against the will of some of its members) to support their coffers that no right-thinking individual with more than a pence to his name would ever sent their cash to.

But Premier Stelmach is certainly right in declaring that Wild Rose’s policy regarding teachers’ right to withhold their labour is “draconian.” It’s part of a draconian labour policy, and what follows is the verbatim labour platform included on their website.

Labour

allow individual workers the choice to determine their membership in labour organizations.

allow competition to the Workers Compensation Board.

extend to workers the democratic right to a secret ballot vote on labour organization certification under the Labour Code and ensure that the same rule apply for de-certification as for certification.

restore education as an essential service under the Labour Code ensuring that no childs right to an education is denied by school strikes or lockouts.

The first policy, which looks “democratic” at first blush, is an effort to revoke the Rand formula, which was devised by Justice Ivan Rand after World War 2 as the way to recognize that everyone in a unionized work place benefits from the collective agreement that the union negotiates and therefore no one should be able to get a free ride by not paying union dues. It also recognizes that if there is a union in place on a worksite that employers might put undue pressure on workers not to join if membership in the union is not compulsory.

In many Southern and Western United States states, “right to work” legislation of the kind supported by plank one in the Wild Rose labour platform has resulted in a complete collapse of unionization, with unsurprisingly devastating consequences for wages and working conditions. Unsurprisingly, while American and Canadian rates of unionization were similar in the 1960s before such legislation was introduced in the U.S.–no Canadian province has such legislation–, the American rate of unionization in 2008 was 12.6 per cent versus 29.4 per cent in Canada.

Oh no, not a "complete lapse of unionization"! If that happens to be the side effect of giving every single person in a company from the CEO to the janitor the exact same fundamental right to free associaton, then fine by me. It sounds like Alvin's big complaint is that this "democratization" comes with a big hit to his union buddies. That isn't and never should be the way to examine legislation. What should be looked at, and what I'm glad Wildrose is looking at, is who is currently at risk of being disenfranchised. Considerable numbers of workers I have formerly and currently work with would refuse utterly to join a union shop, and to present an ability for them to make a choice not to do so just because 2/3rds of their coworkers chose otherwise cannot be considered a bad thing. Unless, of course, your too concerned with union dues going to organizations that can then afford to pepper the airwaves with sob stories every time governments take the axe to departments.

Did he also oppose privatized liquor stores on the basis that the clerks on the government teet were being squeezed out of their cushy union jobs? I ask because such people were the only ones in the province opposed to retail liquor privatization.

Policy 2 above regarding the WCB reflects the Wild Rose’s view that governments can do nothing either efficiently or properly. Better then to privatize their functions. The WCB under the Tories is certainly a mess. Reflecting the Tories’ pro-business and anti-spending fetishes, it tries to prevent injured workers from getting what is supposed to be insurance rather than insuring that they are looked after. In many respects, it mimics how private insurance companies operate, placing corporate profit above the needs of the insured. Wild Rose wants to go the next logical step. Instead of making the WCB a provider of real insurance, and trying to limit necessary payouts by having tough and well-enforced workplace safety legislation, they have opted for simply gradually privatizing the WCB.

Now here we see that similarly, we have found the one person on this earth who thinks the current WCB environment is anything on this side of reason. I've written about WCB issues before, and what always strikes me is that its not privatized NOR is it government run. What happens instead is that any complaint you take to WCB is redirected to your MLA because its provincial legislation that gives carte blanche to WCB... but once you talk to your MLA you're assured that WCB is a totally independent agency outside the purview of government. Employees dislike WCB, employers dislike WCB... it seems the only people who enjoy the Workers Compensation Board are those who happen to cash a paycheque from them. This is not a matter simply helped by tweaking the rules a little in favour of one side of the other. The solution is to give everybody involved one of those grown-up choice. The employers choice of which injurer worker compensation company to go through is now another publicized perk, like which company administers the company supplied RRSP program.

And what about all those “accidents” that cause workers to end up on workers’ compensation? Accidents are in quotes because in almost every case, a so-called accident could be prevented if safety laws were adequate as well as adequately enforced. Well, their numbers will increase as will environmental disasters and dangers to the public of other kinds that might be prevented by proper law enforcement. Wild Rose promises to “cut red tape and the regulatory burden by 1/3.” The likely results are obvious: think Walkerton!

This is waxing poetically about how wonderful it is that some unionized bureaucrat who's never had a lick of practical business experience going around telling risk-taking entrepreneurs and highly trained managers how to dig a hole. There is however some maybe tiny possibility that this is completely unnecessary.

Policy number three above, dealing with secret ballots, has been demonstrated over time in the United States to give employers the ability to threaten workers with shutdowns, job cuts, and the like in order to keep out unions. In the U.S., the progressive wing of Democratic legislators, including President Obama, are committed to the Employee Free Choice Act, which has been introduced in the U.S. House and Senate, and which would allow unions the right to receive certification when they sign up a majority of potential members of a union local. Republican legislators, supporting the same reactionary business interests who oppose universal medical care insurance in their country, have lined up agains the EFCA, claiming that it is undemocratic. In Canada, right-wing business interests, and the Fraser Institute, one of the “think tanks” that business sponsors in an effort to disguise their own efforts to change public policy and public opinion, want the Canadian federal government and the provinces to imitate current American legislation that requires a secret vote no matter how many workers sign up to join a union. Wild Rose, funded by the big oil companies and the big oil companies alone, is part of this business lobby to destroy unions.

Wait, is this actually a complaint that the Wildrose Alliance isn't planning on setting up an Albertan version of the horribly drafted Employee "Free Choice" Act. Maybe next you can grumble how Danielle Smith isn't proposing to have a beefy Italian man stand next to you in the voting booth and ask "are you SURE?" if your pencil gravitates too far from the NDP name, its essentially the same policy. Now look who's in favour of it: Big Unions, in partnership with Big Government proponents like Finkel here who was to destroy businesses of all shapes and sizes.

But wait, there's more. It turns out that the Wildrose Alliance is daring to actually define administration as the act of administering something. Whoa, Nelly!

While Wild Rose claims that it will respect the principles of the Canada Health Act, including public administration, it has a narrow understanding of “administration.” For them, as for the Tories, public administration does not mean public delivery of health. Here are the code words for privatization of health delivery from the Wild Rose policy book: “provide health care funding that will follow the service to the health care provider and approved facility of choice.” So the rich will be able to get the same basic services from a private health care provider, and then supplement that service out of their own money. With what result for the publicly funded health care system? More code words: Wild Rose will “encourage and support innovations in the delivery of health care.”

"The rich"? Who, other than a dumbass college professor who hasn't heard that Marx's class warfare meme has been dumped on like one of the girls from 2 Girls 1 Cup, would bring up "the rich"? Should I care what "the rich" do or don't do with their health? Some of these rich are my friends. Do I want to watch them suffer?

As for "code words", since when has this been a coded phrase for private healthcare (not that, of course, it would be a bad thing!)? Is this also a code phrase? It says basically the exact same thing:

And will Wild Rose deal with gaps in the current health care system and fund the costs associated with an aging population? No. Their fiscal policy is to “limit growth in spending to the rate of inflation and population growth in Alberta.” As we know, that is the Ed Stelmach policy as well. It ignores the fact that, as a recent Parkland Institute study has reiterated, Alberta’s supposed current $4.3 billion deficit could be erased in two seconds if Alberta taxed corporations and individuals at rates similar to what other provinces tax. Indeed, the province could be as much as $20 billion richer than it currently is while still having essentially a free enterprise economy if it properly taxed the energy companies, reintroduced progressive taxation to replace Ralph Klein’s flat tax that no other province has seen fit to emulate, and introduced a small sales tax.

Okay, we can say pretty quickly that this guy's degree isn't in anything remotely related to mathematics, or economics, or some sort of profession where you can learn what kind of bullshit this is. First things first, Alberta absolutely in no way shape or form underspends on anything, let alone on healthcare. Meanwhile, increasing spending on healthcare quite explicitly doesn't do anything. Those in the Alberta left who are so keen on "democratic renewal" should maybe try playing around in Excel for a while first. It can print some very pretty graphs for you while the adults handle facts.

And whats this shit about "the province could be much as $20 billion richer than it currently is while still having essentially a free enterprise economy if it properly taxed the energy companies, reintroduced progressive taxation to replace Ralph Klein’s flat tax that no other province has seen fit to emulate, and introduced a small sales tax"? Maybe "the province" defined as the Albeta Government could be $20 billion richer, though that itself is unlikely. The province as defined as the aggregate sum of the governments and companies and organizations and individuals that reside or operate within Alberta, on the other hand, certainly would not be $20 billion richer. For one, excepting government and those who would be unemployed without money from under the dome, Alberta would quite clearly be at least $20 billion poorer. This, of course, assumes that under this regressive scheme we will be blessed with the same amount of economic activity we already obtained. This, of course, is silly. Its a big planet, and people like Finkel are amazed to learn that if we do things that companies don't like, they don't invest in Alberta. I'm sure the unions and the universities and the other assorted assmunches who propose stuff like this would enjoy that prospect, but the people of Alberta certainly wouldn't.

Either labour gets very involved in Alberta politics, pursuing a DRP-like strategy, or it allows Alberta, already something of an anomaly among Canadian provinces, to become a full-out Alabama with no labour movement worth speaking of.

Well, if those are our options than lets go to the Alabama model. Of course, those aren't our options. We can do better than Alabama. We are Alberta. We can do Alberta, but even better. And that, as I've said many times before, would make Alberta into the best country in the world.

2009-12-21

Basically the story here is that the black guy is upset that the camera isn't following his black face, but is following his coworker's white face. There are a couple things of course that, like any good racial overreaction, sort of defeat the argument.

First off, at one point while the camera is tracking the white girl, he moves into frame and the camera instead focuses on him, ignoring her. It continues to not track him properly, but clearly it notices his face. Secondly, as several commenters noted, he's in a dark room with the contrasts set low: basic physics means that the sensors are going to have to be calibrated far more sensitively in order for it to follow his face: and there will be some false positives associated with it. That's not Hewlett-Packard's racism, that's just reality.

But since he's clearly getting so menstrated up over this whole ordeal, its only fair to comment on his video offensively. So far I have the following two additions to this oeuvre:

Its all a giant misunderstanding,﻿ people. The camera doesn't follow faces, it only follows souls.

(in response to another commenter that somebody should invent a camera that only follows black people):I think a lot of companies﻿ would pay big money for this technology. Jewelry stores come to mind.

What with the 2009 top ten lists bandied about, here's Third Edge of the Sword's ten five saddest deaths of 2009. Brittany Murphy will not appear on this list.

H.M. Ted KennedyHe doesn't deserve a picture. The other Ted Kennedy doesn't deserve one either.5. Irving KristolBill Kristol founded The Weekly Standard in...oh, sorry, wrong Kristol. Irving Kristol was the man who decided to not only push conservatism as a political philosophy but also an intellectual one... in fact, reasoning that the only intellectuals are conservative. You gotta admit he's onto something.4. Roméo LeBlancI phoned Sonic 102.9 when they were talking about celebrity deaths "coming in threes" and wondering who would die next. I angrily reminded them that LeBlanc had died the day before, and he was more than a little important, even though he couldn't sing.3. Ludovic KennedyAnybody who remembers Yes, Minister saw how this famed BBC announcer had a longevity that his peers never could. But did you know his father was a famed WWII merchant captain, and the younger Kennedy took to the seas and participated in the hunt for the Bismark? Ludo also wrote the book about the Lindbergh baby that became the movie Crime of the Century2. Ricardo MontalbanFrom "Baby Its Cold Outside" to The Wrath of Khan, Ricardo did it all. I did a tribute when it happened, and Big Hollywood does a memorial to him as well.1. The United States ConstitutionWell, it did outlive George Burns...

Likewise, "Walking in a Winter Wonderland" is about building a snowman and pretending it is Parson Brown (ie. a Protestant Minister). Despite a half century of re-jigging, the song is not about pretending your snowman is a circus clown.

In the episode "The Official Visit" of Yes, Minister there is the following exchange between the Permanent Secretary of State for the Ministry for Administrative Affairs (Sir Humphrey) and the Permanent Secretary of State of the Foreign Office (Sir Frederick):

Sir Humphrey Appleby: Can you imagine her old man Millen doing a thing like that?

Sir "Jumbo" Frederick: Yes

Sir Humphrey Appleby: Yes, so can I, actually

Wikipedia is of no help, so I'm left wondering who this "her old man" could be a reference to. It's certainly not Prince Phillip.

LAS VEGAS -- The iconic Las Vegas sign has been vandalized for the second time this year.

At about 7:30 Friday morning, a barefoot man wearing a barrel and a Santa's hat threw red paint on the front of the “Welcome to Fabulous Las Vegas” sign and black paint on the back of it, as FOX5 News was broadcasting live.

The man, Joe Pepitone, told FOX5 News he threw the paint at the sign as a form of protest. He was also one of the protesters in front of the Clark County courtroom during the O.J. Simpson heist trial.

Ironically, the FOX newscrew was filming a segment about a previous vandalism attempt on the sign. What makes this story a new level of awesome is that the man vandalising the sign is caught live on video confronting the reporter:

Sha-WING certainly seems to cover it. But then when I watched her video on the SUNshine girl site[caution: this link will not show this video after Christmas Day, 2009 -ed]. I noticed something a little... odd:

First is the writeup that appears under her photo in the paper:

SUNshine Girl Natalya is 22 years old and her hobbies include modelling and dancing. She hopes to become a social worker and her favourite way to spend a night is relaxing at home or at a nice restaurant. OK, you can go back to looking at her photo now. (Alex Ursoveic photo)

But then watch the video, which I paused at the right spot in this screencap, and you see the same girl is apparently named "Natasha".

Team Jones:Jennifer Jones is the biggest name in women's curling in Canada. She has her own website for pete's sake!. As happens a fair bit, Jones herself is the hottest woman on her rink, followed by "fifth" Jennifer Clark. Jill Officer is good but not great, Dawn Askin has a little bit of a Drew Barrymore look to her, and Cathy Clapton is pretty meh.Hottest Player: B+Overall Team: C+

Team Kleibrink:My pick to actually win an Olympic medal in 2010, Shannon Kleibrink is one of the most competitive curling teams, dropping deadweight players as if they were Billy Beane. Shannon herself has a pretty sweet MILF look to her. It does feature some mediocre hotness in Chelsey Bell (ie. every easy-pickup first year University girl ever) and Amy Nixon. Bronwen Webster, on the other hand, is pretty damned sweet.Hottest Player: A-Overall Team: C+

Team Bernard:Another team with their own domain, Calgary's Cheryl Bernard is always a sight to behold. She has a serious Michelle Pfeiffer vibe going, and makes you want to bite your knucles whenever she leans in low for a slow draw. Unfortunately Cheryl leads a pretty ordinary looking team: Cori Bartel and Carolyn Darbyshire are not exactly burning up the house, and Susan O'Connor is decidedly below par.Hottest Player: AOverall Team: D

Team Lawton:Saskabush's Stefanie Lawton has been doing well the last few years, and watching them makes you awestruck how much the girls all look so similar: if you learned they were all cousins (insert random Saskatchewan joke here) it wouldn't really throw you. Second Sherri Singler [say that four times fast! -ed] is damned gorgeous in the same way Jolene Blalock is not, and her skip isn't too far behind. Lana Vey certainly isn't being kicked out of bed. Marliese Kasner can't compare to the top two for sure, but not all that bad of a dropoff.Hottest Player: A-Overall Team: B-

Team Webster:Another Calgarian team (none from Edmonton this time), Crystal Webster has BJ lips like you would not believe. Second Sam Preston is another pretty hot cougarish blonde, but Lori Olson-Jones and Stephanie Malekoff both suffer from oddly shaped faces. Weird, huh?Hottest Player: B+Overall Team: C

Team Scott:No, the Scotties Tournament of Hearts is not named after Kelly Scott. Its easy to be confused, though. Though good curlers, its a pretty ordinary group. Kelly Scott is a tiny little thing, but certainly not where your eye tends to. The hottest player on the team now that they've lost Renee Simons is new cutie Jacquie Armstrong. Sasha Carter and Jeanna Schraeder are both tall glasses of water that make a man crave gin.Hottest Player: BOverall Team: D-

Team McCarville:Seemingly coming out of nowhere, Northern Ontario's Krista McCarville is the new face at Roar of the Rings. Krista is certainly a cute little number running her team, and Tara George is a classical beauty that its a joy to see play. I'll skip over Lorraine Lang who seems to be on the team because she's the skip's great-grandmother and discuss one of the hottest players at the tournament: not only does Kari MacLean look absolutely drop-dead gorgeous but she also has an amazing ass... watching her sweep makes the heart swoon.Hottest Player: A+Overall Team: C+

Team Holland:Amber Holland is looking a lot better than she once did, but she's not the reason to watch this team. Lead Heather Kalenchuk is a cute little thing, but make sure you're checking out the right Schneider if you want to ogle this team. Second Tammy is a far far far cry from Kim Schneider, wearing some nice black glasses in the Roar of the Rings opening day. She has the Sarah Palin look I so love that I worried I would have to go without Quebec's Team Laroche in the tournament.Hottest Player: A+Overall Team: B-

So there you have it. I might end up going to a game or two... stay tuned for possible live reports, updated with word on how they look in the dim light of a romantic dinner at an upscale restaurant...

Twenty years ago, some guy in Montreal went crazy and shot some women.

There's really no more that needs to be said about this, unlike things like Fort Hood there's no greater lesson that can be learned from this incident, despite the work of hopolophobic gun-nuts like Wendy Culkier.

So, in honour of the anniversary of Gamil Gharbi's little escapade, I present two YouTube videos that aptly describe the proper way to react to this anniversary:

Don't floor it! Rock back and forth, and have your front wheels straight if you stuck.

The two best pieces of advice though are either the bit in the title (yes, some idiot driving a BMW roadster was stuck on an open road this afternoon), and to consider if you even have to drive anywhere. Chances are, you do not.